Blood is thicker than Water
by Lady Shayla
Summary: When a slave and a pair of outcast foxes team up to fight in the biggest battle that Mossflower has ever seen, not every one will make it out alive.


IMPORTANT!! This will continue (and follow the summary) but I have finals coming up so after that more chapters will be added.

But here is the Prelude so enjoy...

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The sounds of battle were all around me as I ran after my father. The clank of the battle armor was deafening as we ran down the beach. The hares were shouting the traditional war cry. The first wave of sea rats was almost upon me. My father threw himself right into the front line. I watched in great awe as he swung his mighty broadsword at the rats that were now surrounding him. The nearest rats' heads were severed from their bodies; their blood splattered my father and made him look as fierce as I have ever seen him. I started to imagine him as a young badger like me going to his first battle as fierce as he was right now but my daydream was cut short as the first few rats turned their attention toward me. I pulled my longbow off my shoulder and notched an arrow. There were five different rats running toward me. I barely had time to think as my first arrow ripped through the eye of the closest rat and it stopped in the throat of the next. I looked for my next target but the remaining rats were too close to use my bow; I took out my twin short swords and started twirling them in my hands. I lunged at the rat closest to my right and sliced from his hip up to his shoulder and whipped my sword across the throat of the next. This almost severed his head completely. His body fell into the sand with a muffled thump.

But the first rat I sliced wasn't dead yet, from the cut across his stomach his guts were spilling into his hands as he tried to stop the bleeding, and I couldn't help but stare as he took his last look around at the blooded battlefield. I could see as he struggled for a breath he would never again take. His blood was splattering everywhere. I felt bile rise in my throat, the realization of what I had just done hit me hard. I dropped both my swords and looked at them; they were already stained with my first kill. I had to look away; my body was shaking too badly to think. This was the first time I had ever killed a living, breathing rat. I looked again as the rat fell to the ground with a thud; the growing puddle of blood was beginning to show. I felt pain in my side where another rat had sliced me with his sword, I grabbed my side to stop the bleeding, but I couldn't force myself to fight back. I looked up as he raised his sword to cut off my head, I was bracing myself for the death I knew was coming, but he was violently thrown aside. I looked up to see my savior and almost cried.

The mighty Fox Ciarán was looking straight at me. I tried to recall all of my training and tried not to black out. He smiled a sick smile and put his sword to my throat. The cold steel on my skin was slowly drawing a bloody line down my throat. My father was still off in the distance and didn't notice. Ciarán was about to make him notice. I felt a hot pain on my neck and felt warm blood run down my shoulder, as he gashed my skin from throat to shoulder. It didn't hurt until he took his sword out of my neck and stuck it straight into my right foot and twisted. This was more pain than I have ever felt as the sword ripped through the muscle and bone in my foot and I couldn't help but cry out, as I realized this had crippled my foot. My whole leg gave out and I fell against Ciarán, he wrapped his hand around the back of my throat and held my upright.

This was when my father noticed my condition and roared loud, shaking every last one of the rats to the bone. Everyone stopped and look in my direction. Every rat and hare alike looked at Ciarán expecting him to speak but the only thing they got in response was a blank stare. GreatStripe swung his broadsword in the direction of a rat that had inched toward him; this severed his head completely spilling his blood across the still battleground. GreatStripe roared again and then spoke, "What do you want?" but his voice came out as a strangled growl. Everyone could feel him holding back his want to claw out the jackal's throat, as he held on to mine.

I wanted to cry out and tell him to save the mountain and not me, to sacrifice his beloved daughter and save his beloved mountain; but I didn't. I couldn't tell him to let me die. I wanted to stay alive another day, to live and not die among the enemy's of my fathers who were cut down by his mighty broadsword; I wanted to die among friends. So I kept quiet and hoped he would think of some way to save me. The battlefield was silent, waiting for the fox to do something. The response my father got was not the usual demand of the great mountain of Salamandastron or the surrender to his superior army. The response to my silent wishing was to have the sword ripped out of my crippled foot and cut across my thro-


End file.
